


there's nothing left for us there

by mollykor



Category: Event Horizon (1997)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, I'm Bad At Tagging, M/M, Mentioned Smith, Platonic Relationships, Romantic Friendship, Smoking, Stars, a heck of a lot of caffeine
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-18
Updated: 2021-03-18
Packaged: 2021-03-27 12:07:04
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,465
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/30122508
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mollykor/pseuds/mollykor
Summary: “Well then, maybe ignoranceisbliss. Why worry yourself about something no-one has the answers to?”
Relationships: D.J./Dr. William Weir
Comments: 2
Kudos: 2





	there's nothing left for us there

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Mela_Rotta](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mela_Rotta/gifts).



> so instead of a second chapter to infernis, i got bored and wrote this instead i guess. this is definitely inspired by Mela_Rotta 's _Tidal Locking_ , which i loved so much and eagerly await the second chapter of !! also, i deliberately wrote this so that you could take their relationship as either platonic OR romantic, so yeah y’all can pick i guess. anyways, enjoy this fic, leave kudos and comments and live long and prosper :)

“Wait, you built that? You made it?”

“I did,” he murmured. “A long time ago. It cost me twenty years, not to mention the death of my wife.”

“Why?”

Some crumpled copy of a smile crossed his face. “It was going to change the world.”

D.J. studied the man opposite him’s face carefully, scrutinising every detail. From the way his eyes crinkled slightly even though his smile didn’t quite reach them, to the way his lips turned less upwards and more outwards, even down to how his hands clasped more tightly with every word he said, his fingers entwined and tensed, he took it all in. 

It was the saddest smile he had ever seen. 

“I don’t know what went wrong. It was all supposed to be perfect. A new era in space travel, a way to move between point A and point B in mere minutes. I did every calculation a million times, there was no room for error, there was absolutely no way it could’ve gone wrong. And look where it landed me.” Weir smile disappeared as he spoke more, his eyebrows drawing together. His eyes remained dry, if only slightly red, and no sadness was evident in his voice, which confused D.J. slightly. He talked about the whole thing with barely any emotion, the tragic suicide of his wife, the loss of his life’s work, all of this and he didn’t feel sad about it? There was a smattering of anger and malice in his voice, not directed at anyone to the best of D.J.’s knowledge, but then again, they weren’t friends. They had both made that clear.

He didn’t know what to say in response. He was a doctor, basically trained to listen to people and make them feel heard, but in that moment, D.J. felt like nothing that he could say would make any of this situation better. It was certainly a strange feeling for him. He opted for a soft hum, a quiet phatic noise that someone would make if talking to someone over the phone or not directly, pulling his eyes away from Weir’s confusing face and instead gazed out the window of the Medbay, slightly to the left of the other man’s head.

The stars never failed to amaze him. Even growing up as he had, D.J. didn’t think that he would ever look at the stars and feel anything other than dazed, as if he couldn’t believe that they were really there, that he was really out here in space, the place he had so often visited in his mind during his childhood. Back then it had been a coping mechanism and a form of daydreaming, but now, now he was doing what his younger self always dreamed about- exploring the far reaches of the galaxy.

“You look at the stars like you’ve never seen them before.” Weir’s voice sliced through the silence that had built up, not unwelcome but startling D.J. out of his dream as he flinched slightly, shoulders hunching forward slightly and curling in on himself the tiniest bit out of habit. Forcing himself to sit up straighter again, he returned his look once again to the doctor in front of him. D.J. contemplated what he had just said, tilting his head to the left as he so often did when he was lost in thought.

“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to make you feel uncomfortable or anything-“

“No!” He said sharply and just a tad too fast, “God, no, you didn’t make me uncomfortable, I was just thinking how correct you were.” D.J. offered him a small smile on the last few words, letting out an exhale disguised as a laugh. “Every time I’m out on the Lewis and Clarke, it’s like- it’s all new to me again. I dunno why, I’ve obviously seen the stars before and heck, I spend the majority of my time in a tin can in space, but I- something about the wonder of it all never ceases to amaze me, I guess.”

“I feel the same sometimes.” Concluding their conversation, the pair of them settled back into a comfortable silence as D.J. returned once again to stare out of the window, and Weir went back to looking over the paperwork that was spread over the table in front of him, occasionally looking up to take a sip of the lukewarm coffee in the grey mug beside him.

“Do you mind if I smoke?” D.J. whispered quietly. He wasn’t sure why he was speaking so softly, but something about the atmosphere between them told him that he shouldn’t talk loudly for fear of ruining the doctor’s concentration or something of the like.

“Not at all.” Came the muted reply of his companion, so D.J. fished into the pocket of his jumpsuit and pulled out the packet of his cigarettes. Lighting one up with a lighter he found on the table, probably Smith’s, he placed it between his lips and cursed slightly as he realised that he only had a few left. As he inhaled, the bitter taste that he craved so dearly filled his mouth and lungs, burning slightly but the sting a welcome feeling to his slowly numbing, sleep-deprived brain. He exhaled slowly, savouring the way the clouds of euphoria felt encased in his mouth and the way they slipped past his lips with no resistance, forming wispy streaks of grey in the air around him. 

After a few long drags on the glowing stick perched between his lips, he leaned over the doctor’s shoulder, reading from the sheet in placed directly in front of him. He didn’t understand any of the numbers or data on the charts and woven into the paragraphs laid before him, all the words going into his brain in the correct order but meaning nothing to him.

“See, there are no mistakes. The _Event Horizon_ was last seen here, exactly where it should’ve been. There was nothing wrong.” Weir was muttering to himself every so often, confirming out loud what was on the paper and in his head already, and D.J. suspected that it was not for his benefit. Sighing and resting his head in his hands, Weir gave up on trying to find the answers in the data he had poured over so already so many times, coming to the rational conclusion that no matter how many times he read the same sentence, nothing new would jump out at him or give him an answer to why it all went wrong.

Turning his head, Weir turned to look at D.J. again.

“I just don’t get it.” He sounded dejected, nothing giving him an answer to the question he had so desperately seeked one for his whole life.

“Neither do I. But sometimes it’s better that way.” D.J. quietly admitted, shuffling closer to the man beside him so that the sides of their arms touched. “You remember the old Earth saying right? Ignorance is bliss?”

Weir smiled at him. “Of course I do.”

“Well then, maybe ignorance _is_ bliss. Why worry yourself about something no-one has the answers to?” D.J. lowered his voice, the two of them in such close proximity now that he could practically hear the other man’s heartbeat softly thrumming in his chest. He watched the other man’s face turn sad again, his eyebrows straightening and drawing together slightly in the middle again but still keeping his smile.

“Because I’m the one who should have the answers. It’s my problem.”

“It doesn’t have to be.” D.J. cut in after Weir had finished talking. “You could put this all behind you, retire to Earth somewhere, maybe even Mars, live out the rest of your days with a dog and a seaside home.”

Weir laughed slightly at that, his smile returning to a neutral sort, not quite joyful but not sorrowful either.

“I couldn’t do that; I would never be able to give all of this up. Space is so interesting and to think that one day I would have to retire to a planet, never to jet into the stars again? I really can’t see me doing that, to be honest with you.” The unspoken fact that he didn’t want to settle down, not when his wife was gone, hung in the air between them, much like the smoke of D.J.’s now long extinguished cigarette.

Shuffling closer to him again, D.J. rested his head gently on the other man’s shoulder as they both gazed out of the large window, out into the stars they both found comfort in, and realised one thing- they could never give up this life, there was nothing left for either of them on Earth.


End file.
